Brian Shipman
MJ reminds of a time in my youth when it seemed
people went out of their way to find common ground with each other. I’m not
kidding. I’m 48 years old and I remember very well my Dad’s army buddies
choosing sides between Goldwater and Kennedy (most of them went for Barry) and
having fantastic long lasting discussions on issues ranging from race to foreign
policy. Ideas and opinions flowed as freely as the liquor and both were
exchanged with smiles and laughter. The group was a mixture of Southern Baptist,
Catholics and Atheist and no topic was taboo for this group including religion.
They were always brought back by the things they had in common, each other and
service to country.
MJ also reminded me of a lesson we had last week in my ethics class regarding religion. It covered J. Vernon Jenson and his six ethical standards shared by the seven major religions on our planet. Truthfulness, do not slander, do not dishonor sacred persons,
do not demean others, aim to earn trust and help improve others appears to be
the standards of all major religions. I found it’s also the common ground
between the seven major religions and atheism. So, why do we have religion
again?

Brian Shipman

Drury University

Masters Candidate

Keith Collyer

Replace “sacred” in those standards with something less religious and way to go. Though actually, you could remove that standard altogether, as it is covered by “do not demean others”, as is “do not slander”. So there are really four ethical standards.

Anonymous

What does it mean “do not dishonor sacred persons? What if they dishonored themselves, can I mention that fact? I can agree with not slandering because I requires you to lie. However many sacred persons have behaved dishonorably so why not mention the fact?

Anonymous

I betcha if you list those supposed six ethical standards shared by the seven major religions that I can find teachings in those same religions that contracdict those standards. You don’t get to claim to be in support of an ethical standard when your religion doesn’t clearly come down on one side. You can’t advocate terror and also claim you are peaceful. Sure you may advocate against murder out of one side of your mouth but it doesn’t count if you also set up a double standard that counts murder of non-belivers as good old fashioned justice.

Anonymous

MJ, I don’t get it. I can’t even tell who is supposed to be who. The title doesn’t help either. Why would one desire that our internal arguments go like that? Do you actually want atheists to accept arguments based on how sweet they are?

Are you saying the accomodationists are being sweet? What’s sweet about someone siding with social conventions on politeness that assume you cannot question genocidal and defamatory claims inherent in various religions? What’s sweet about not only ignoring such things but actively cultivating the prejudices of the religious?